The Memory Keeper of Kyiv (98)

She looked at Cassie. “Maybe this will be hard to believe, but once, long ago, like you, I loved to write. I promised Pavlo that I would write our story and tell the world what happened to us. What was done to us. I did what he asked. I wrote it here.” She pointed at the journal. “But I could never tell the world. I was too scared. I don’t just want you to know my story, Cassie. I want you to write it for me. Share my story, our story, with everyone, so what happened to us never happens again.”

Cassie shot a guilty glance toward Nick. “Oh, Bobby, I don’t know that I could do it justice. And actually, I think my mom is going to finish it up with Nick instead of me.”

“I am?” Anna said at the same time Bobby scoffed. “Bah! You are the writer in our family. It has to be you. Please, do this for me. It will be the last thing I ever ask of you.”

Way to drive that guilt home. Cassie met Nick’s eyes, and heat flooded her face. Her feelings for him were so tangled and complicated. She didn’t know how she could bear working so closely with him without hurting him or herself, but what choice did she have?

“All right, if Nick doesn’t mind helping me, I’ll do it for you.”

“I’ll do anything you need,” Nick said.

Bobby exhaled and visibly relaxed. “Thank you. I don’t think I could leave knowing I failed on that promise.”

She glanced down at the top picture on the pile and picked it up. “Oh, I always loved this one of us.”

“That’s Alina and that’s you!” Birdie pointed to each girl. “Alina looks almost the same, but you look different.”

Bobby chuckled and touched her wrinkled cheek. “Yes, I look very different, don’t I?”





32





KATYA





Ukraine, May 1933





That spring, when the earth came back to life, so did the collective, and word spread that work and food were available again. Katya supposed the state figured that anyone left alive was broken enough to do whatever they wanted, and they were right. Once, everyone had cursed the collective. Now, Kolya and Katya, with Halya on her hip, along with the other survivors, eagerly made their way to the collective farm to work every day. They planted that season’s crops, hardly able to stay on their feet as they sowed the seeds. But for each day of work, they received a bowl of watery soup and a chunk of bread. Every day, more people came with their haunted, hollow eyes and blank faces, all of them half-dead and void of emotion. They barely spoke to each other. What was there to say?

Still, people continued to die. Some in the fields, right before the food was doled out, and others after they ate, their bodies unable to process the food they so desperately needed. Somehow, some way, Katya, Kolya, and Halya survived this as well. Each meal they were given was small and weak, but it was the most food they’d had consistently in months.

To supplement that, Katya harvested flowers from the blossoming acacia trees, earthworms moving through the spring soil, tadpoles from the pond, and the dandelions sprouting in her yard, and bit by bit, their bodies began to recover.

As their strength gradually returned, life began to assume a rhythm again. They rose early and walked to the fields together. They worked with the remaining villagers and the newly imported Russians—sent in to replace all of the dead Ukrainians—living day to day with no promise of anything to look forward to. They ate the food the collective gave them, thankfully and carefully, never spilling a precious drop.





As the weather warmed and summer arrived, Katya moved Halya to a small trundle bed so the girl could sleep later each morning without Katya bothering her when she woke. Slowly, but surely, Halya was gaining strength and growing. When she scooted herself across the bed for the first time, Katya celebrated as if Halya had taken her first steps or read her first words. Every milestone, no matter how small, was a triumph.

She waited for Kolya to return to his bed, too, but he didn’t. Each night, she stripped down to her underclothes and got into bed, and each night, he climbed in with her.

The old Katya would have said something to him, she wrote in her journal. Asked him why he still lies with me, but now, I am afraid to say or do anything that might stop one of the few sources of joy I have every day. I find more and more that I want him pressed close against me, that I revel in the feel of his lean body touching mine.

Shame filled her as she composed the disloyal words. Her feelings for Kolya weren’t right or reciprocated, but she didn’t know what to do about them.

One night, she woke to find herself splayed across him, arms and legs tangled, her head resting on his chest. His body vibrated under hers like the thrumming of a hummingbird’s wings.

She sat up and found him, eyes wide open, watching her. She sucked in a breath. “I’m sorry. I’ll move over.”

His face was inches from hers, his voice husky. “No. Don’t.”

She froze, her heart hammering against her ribs. “Don’t move?”

He reached out and ran his hand through her hair. “I like you close to me.”

“You do?” Her voice wavered at the thrilling feel of his fingertips on her skin.

“I do. I’m sorry, Katya. I’ve tried to be strong. To fight this. But I don’t think I want to fight it any longer.”